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Category:Alma

The name "Alma" in the Book of Mormon

The name Alma has been found on ancient tablets at Ebla

Terrence L. Szink,

Among the texts of Ebla are six separate documents that contain the personal name al6-ma written eight times (on two of the tablets the name occurs twice). Originally there was some uncertainty about the reading of the cuneiform sign al6, but this has been resolved and al6 is now an accepted reading at Ebla. It is not certain whether the transactions recorded at Ebla refer to just one person named Alma, or to several. In one document Alma is identified as a merchant from Mari, a city situated on the river Euphrates. Most likely the name al6-ma at Ebla is used to identify a male, there being few female merchants at Ebla.[1]

Alma appears as a male name in the third millennium BC from the archives a Ebla (located in Syria)

Stephen D. Ricks,

Although the female personal name Alma (from the Latin adjective almus, alma, almum, “nurturing, fostering,”) is popular in the Western tradition of naming, the male personal name Alma is of incontestable antiquity. The name appears at least eight times in documents dating from the late third millennium BC from the archives at Ebla (located in modern-day Syria).[2] It also occurs in the Bar Kokhba letters, dating from the period of the Second Jewish Revolt in AD 132–35.[3] It appears as Alma ben Yehudah (“Alma son of Judah”) in a business document and is written both ʾlmʾ and ʾlmh.[4]

Alma is a proper Old World name

Hugh Nibley,

Far more popular among the Arabs as among the Nephites was the name Alma, which can mean a young man, a coat of mail, a mountain, or a sign.[5]

"Alma ben Yehuda" is an authentic Hebrew name

Matthew Roper,

As can be seen, critics have had a lot of fun with the name Alma, however, in the 1960s Israeli archaeologist Yigael Yadin discovered a land deed near the Dead Sea dating to the early second century A.D. and rendered the name of a Jew mentioned therein as “Alma ben Yehuda” showing for the first time in modern history that the name Alma was an authentic Hebrew male name. Additional research in Ebla, in what is modern Syria, has also turned up this name showing that it goes back to nearly 2200 B.C. [6]

The name Alma appears on a Jewish document of the early second century AD

John A. Tvedtnes, John Gee, and Matthew Roper,

Two of these names have been discussed in previous issues of the Journal. Jeffrey Chadwick demonstrated that Sariah, known in the Book of Mormon as the name of Lehi's wife, appears on one of the papyri written by members of a Jewish community in Elephantine, Egypt, in the fifth century BC and discovered at the turn of the twentieth century, and on several seals and clay bullae (for the meaning of this and other technical terms, see the glossary on page 44) found in Israel that date from the time of Lehi.[7] Paul Hoskisson, following up on previous notes from Hugh Nibley,[8] showed that the name Alma appears on a Jewish document of the early second century AD, also found in Israel.[9] Terrence Szink provided evidence that the name Alma is even older, being attested on clay tablets found at the northwestern Syrian site of Ebla and dating to the second half of the third millennium BC4 A number of other biblical names have been found at Ebla, which is in the region that some scholars consider to be the homeland of the Hebrews.[10]

↑Hugh W. Nibley, An Approach to the Book of Mormon, 3rd edition, (Vol. 6 of the Collected Works of Hugh Nibley), edited by John W. Welch, (Salt Lake City, Utah : Deseret Book Company ; Provo, Utah : Foundation for Ancient Research and Mormon Studies, 1988), Chapter 6, references silently removed—consult original for citations.